What is ventricular fibrillation? | Med School life #medschoollife #mbbsabroad #shorts

What is ventricular fibrillation?

Ventricular fibrillation (V-fib) is a dangerous type of arrhythmia, or irregular heartbeat. It affects your heart’s ventricles. Your heart is a muscle system that contains 4 chambers; the 2 bottom chambers are the ventricles. In a healthy heart, your blood pumps evenly in and out of these chambers. This keeps blood flowing throughout your body.

An arrhythmia that starts in your ventricle is called ventricular fibrillation. This occurs when the electrical signals that tell your heart muscle to pump cause your ventricles to quiver (fibrillate) instead. The quivering means that your heart is not pumping blood out to your body. In some people, V-fib may happen several times a day. This is called an “electrical storm.”

Because sustained V-fib can lead to cardiac arrest and death, it requires immediate medical attention.

What causes ventricular fibrillation?

The cause of ventricular fibrillation is not always known but it can occur during certain medical conditions. V-fib most commonly occurs during an acute heart attack or shortly thereafter. When heart muscle does not get enough blood flow, it can become electrically unstable and cause dangerous heart rhythms. A heart that has been damaged by a heart attack or other heart muscle damage is vulnerable to V-fib.

Other causes include electrolyte abnormalities such as low potassium, certain medicines, and certain genetic diseases that affect the heart's ion channels or electrical conduction.